BROOKS B18 Help
 

So I bought a Brooks B18 for my wife off ebay for 90 bucks. The leather is perfect it looks hardly ridden but the person before loosened up the tension bolt too much now the whole bolt turns. I tried grabbing the front end with a needle nose vice grips and it won't turn, does anyone have any help on this ir am i going to have to send it off to www.transportcycle.com.

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...22a1745ad6.jpg

The metal grinding part is my fault from the vice grips.
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...9699af63ef.jpg

the bolt is attached to the metal nose piece right? You may need to grip the whole nose, wrapped in an old inner tube, with some channel locks. This may sound silly but you are turning the right direction? I mean honestly I am having a hard time visualizing which way it should go

A little lube between the nut face and tension shackle where they meet won't hurt either.

Instead of marring the threads on the bolt, thread and tighten two nuts on the end to get a non-destructive purchase on it.

How loose is the nose hardware, anyway? It should be tight enough that it doesn't actually rattle around, but it doesn't need to be tighter than that.

Which is easy if you know what the thread is.

Yeah, I've got stoopid amounts of nuts in boxes that frankly don't fit anything AFAIK.

+1 along with a little oil on the nut at the nose.
Ben

Worst case you place a small tack weld with a mig gun between the rounded head of the bolt and the metal nose piece to keep it from turning.